The Cyber Safety Seminar in St. Joseph the Worker Church, Neermarga

Cyber Safety Seminar for the parishioners of Neermarga Parish was organized by the Commission for Social Communication and the Commission for Women on 4^thSeptember,2022 that prepared parents to effectually supervise their child on social media sites, protect them from online threats, and bring technological balance back to their homes.

The Holy Eucharist was celebrated by Rev Fr Anil Ivan Fernandes – Director, Canara Communication Centre, Mangalore  and the Holy Hour led by Rev Fr. Anil Canute D Mello, Parish Priest. The entire Parish Community placed themselves in the presence of the Eucharistic Lord to thank and praise Him for His countless blessings and to obtain graces.

The workshop commenced with an  invocation by the church Choir – seeking the benisons of the omnipresent, omnipotent, and the omniscient followed by lighting a ceremonious lamp by Rev. Fr Anil D Mello, Parish Priest, Rev Fr Anil Ivan Fernandes key note speaker of the day, Mr. Ravi Saldanha and Mr. Prakash Pereira – Vice President and Secretary of Parish Pastoral Council, Mrs. Zita Usha Fernandes and Mr. Prasad Vas- Coordinators of Commission for Women and Commission for Social Communication respectively.

Fr Anil D Mello, Parish Priest spoke about Carlo Acutis, a Catholic Italian teenager who died in 2006, was beatified Oct. 10, 2020 in Assisi. The internet to Carlo was a means of Evangelization -another space in which he was able to transmit God. Using his computer skills, Carlo designed an Online Eucharistic Miracles and thereby Carlo’s example offers a roadmap to young people wondering how they can live Holy Lives in this day and age. He further emphasized on positive and negative effects of technology that was indeed galvanizing.

Mr. Prasad Vas, introduced Rev Fr Anil Ivan Fernandes to the Gathering. Rev Fr Anil Fernandes spoke at length about digital well-being app—its Working, benefits and setting up of parental controls on child’s phone using digital wellbeing and the google family link app. He discussed basic concepts -Cyberspace and Cybersecurity, URL (Uniform Resource Locator)—Functions, Parts and Examples. He spotlighted on the differences between real and fake websites, spam and phishing emails and email spam trigger words to avoid.  He further underlined the different techniques to generate passwords.

On the whole the workshop taught the participants ways to protect computer operating systems, networks and data from cyber attacks that was indeed invigorating.

Pramith D Souza, Jelroy Vas, Lester Saldanha, Ancita Crasta helped in the smooth running of the event. Mrs.  Gretta Vas compered the programme. Mr. Prasad welcomed the esteemed guests and Mr. Wilfred Lobo and  Mrs. Zita Usha Fernandes   proposed the Vote of Thanks.